Join the Cyber Policy Center on August 26th, at 10 a.m. pacific time, for a look how governments around the world are pushing to ban strong encryption. The talk will feature speakers Sam Woolley, Riana Pfefferkorn and Mathew Baum as they explore the different policy issues being used by governments to justify their agendas. This event is open to the public, but registration is required.

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Matthew A. Baum (Ph.D., UC San Diego, 2000) is the Marvin Kalb Professor of Global Communications and Professor of Public Policy at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government and Department of Government. His research focuses on delineating the effects of domestic politics on international conflict and cooperation in general and American foreign policy in particular, as well as on the role of the mass media and public opinion in contemporary American politics. His research has appeared in over a dozen leading scholarly journals, such as the American Political Science Review, American Journal of Political Science, and the Journal of Politics. His books include Soft News Goes to War: Public Opinion and American Foreign Policy in the New Media Age (2003, Princeton University Press), War Stories: The Causes and Consequences of Public Views of War (2009, Princeton University Press, co-authored with Tim Groeling), and War and Democratic Constraint: How the Public Influences Foreign Policy (2015, Princeton University Press, co-authored with Phil Potter). He has also contributed op-ed articles to a variety of newspapers, magazines, and blog sites in the United States and abroad. Before coming to Harvard, Baum was an associate professor of political science and communication studies at UCLA. 

Riana Pfefferkorn is the Associate Director of Surveillance and Cybersecurity at the Stanford Center for Internet and Society. Her work focuses on investigating and analyzing the U.S. government's policy and practices for forcing decryption and/or influencing crypto-related design of online platforms and services, devices, and products, both via technical means and through the courts and legislatures. Riana also researches the benefits and detriments of strong encryption on free expression, political engagement, economic development, and other public interests.

Dr. Samuel Woolley is a writer and researcher. He is an assistant professor in the School of Journalism and in the School of Information (by courtesy) at the University of Texas at Austin.  He is the program director of propaganda research at the Center for Media Engagement at UT. Woolley's work focuses on the ways in which emerging technology are leveraged for both democracy and control. He is the author of the book "The Reality Game: How the Next Wave of Technology Will Break the Truth" (PublicAffairs), an exploration of how tools from artificial intelligence to virtual reality are being used in efforts to manipulate public opinion and discusses what society can do to respond. He is the co-editor (with Dr. Philip N. Howard), of the book "Computational Propaganda" (Oxford University Press), a series of country-based case studies on social media and digital information operations. 

**Please note all CDDRL events are scheduled using the Pacific Time Zone

About the Event:

On November 3, in the midst of a pandemic, America elects its next President. CDDRL scholars will discuss the election results (or election challenges), Trump and Biden, key Congressional races, and what to expect between November and Inauguration Day. Join Bruce Cain, Nate Persily, Hakeem Jefferson, and Didi Kuo.

About the Speakers:

Bruce E. Cain is a Professor of Political Science at Stanford University and Director of the Bill Lane Center for the American West. He received a BA from Bowdoin College (1970), a B Phil. from Oxford University (1972) as a Rhodes Scholar, and a Ph D from Harvard University (1976). He taught at Caltech (1976-89) and UC Berkeley (1989-2012) before coming to Stanford. Professor Cain was Director of the Institute of Governmental Studies at UC Berkeley from 1990-2007 and Executive Director of the UC Washington Center from 2005-2012. His areas of expertise include political regulation, applied democratic theory, representation and state politics.

Nathaniel Persily is the James B. McClatchy Professor of Law at Stanford Law School, with appointments in the departments of Political Science, Communication and FSI.  Prior to joining Stanford, Professor Persily taught at Columbia and the University of Pennsylvania Law School, and as a visiting professor at Harvard, NYU, Princeton, the University of Amsterdam, and the University of Melbourne. Professor Persily’s scholarship and legal practice focus on American election law or what is sometimes called the “law of democracy,” which addresses issues such as voting rights, political parties, campaign finance, redistricting, and election administration. He has served as a special master or court-appointed expert to craft congressional or legislative districting plans for Georgia, Maryland, Connecticut, and New York, and as the Senior Research Director for the Presidential Commission on Election Administration. In addition to dozens of articles (many of which have been cited by the Supreme Court) on the legal regulation of political parties, issues surrounding the census and redistricting process, voting rights, and campaign finance reform.

Hakeem Jefferson is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Stanford University. His research interests move at the intersection of American politics and social psychology. In particular, his current work examines the conditions under which members of stigmatized groups punish group members who transgress social norms. Moving beyond a study of identity that centers largely on the attitudes and predilections of dominant social groups, his work explores the psychological and instrumental considerations stigmatized individuals bring to bear in response to “bad” (negatively stereotyped) behavior from within their own group. Using African-Americans as the test case, this work builds on scholarship about the politics of respectability and in-group policing to inform conversations about Blacks’ attitudes toward punitive social policies.

Didi Kuo is the Associate Director for Research and Senior Research Scholar at the Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law at Stanford University. She is a scholar of comparative politics, with a focus on democratization, corruption and clientelism, political parties and institutions, and political reform. Her recent work examines changes to party organization, and the impact these changes have on the ability of governments to address challenges posed by global capitalism. She is the author of Clientelism, Capitalism, and Democracy: the rise of programmatic politics in the United States and Britain (Cambridge University Press, 2018), which examines the role of business against clientelism and the development of modern political parties in the nineteenth-century.

Join Recruitment and Admissions Manager Meghan Moura to learn more about the Master's in International Policy program and how to apply. Registration is required: https://stanford.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_RvF8FTfsSWWDZscWQTHFTw